


A is for Appendicitis

by taylor_tut



Series: A to Z Multifandom Whump [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: A-Z, Appendicitis, Friendship, Gen, Gen Work, Hunk & Lance (Voltron) Friendship, Lance (Voltron) Whump, Lance (Voltron) is a Mess, Shipwrecks, Sick Character, Sick Lance (Voltron), Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-17
Updated: 2018-01-17
Packaged: 2019-03-05 23:20:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13398399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taylor_tut/pseuds/taylor_tut
Summary: An A to Z multifandom whump thing I'm doing. For A, the paladins are shipwrecked on an ocean planet... but Lance's sore stomach is a little more than seasickness.





	A is for Appendicitis

“I want to go home,” Lance complained for the hundredth time.

“We know, Lance; we all want to go home,” Keith snapped. “I’m sure Allura is doing everything she can, but right now, we’ve got to focus.”

Pidge scoffed. “Focus on what?” she asked, gesturing to the miles and miles of ocean that surrounded them. “We’re in a rescue raft in the middle of the sea on an alien planet with no land. We’re up the universe’s creek, very literally without a paddle.”

Hunk bit down a laugh, knowing that it would upset Keith, whose eyebrows were already twitching in irritation.

“Focus on surviving,” Keith said through a tight jaw.

“Okay, so, like… deciding who we’re eating first?” Pidge asked. “I vote for Shiro.”

Shiro frowned. “Why me?” he asked, sounding personally offended by the thought.

“Well, Lance and Keith are both too tiny--barely enough to make a cutlet, though I think Lance would be very tender… And we need Hunk to cook whoever’s our Richard Parker.”

“Ooh, Shiro steak would be lean,” Hunk added.

“I was thinking he’d make a good chili,” Pidge corrected, and Hunk seemed to consider this.

“Ugh, please don’t talk about food,” Lance groaned, “my stomach is killing me.”

Hunk’s eyebrows knitted together in sympathy. “Ohh, buddy. Are you seasick?” Pidge not-so-subtly inched away from him, but Lance shook his head.

“Nah, it’s been bugging me since last night,” Lance replied.

Shiro now sat forward, worry clear across his face. “You didn’t say anything?”

Lance shrugged. “It wasn’t that bad.” The past tense of “wasn’t” didn’t escape Shiro’s notice, but he let it go when Keith sighed again.

“We need to be trying to figure out how to get back to the Lions,” he said, ignoring Lance’s complaints. He’d heard enough whining, and nowhere near enough productive ideas.

“Relax, Keith,” Hunk reassured, “Allura told us to just sit tight, that she’d come rescue us as soon as she can.”

“And what if that’s not soon enough?” Keith argued. “It could be hours--days, before she’s able to get to us.”

“Guys, I don’t--my stomach hurts,” Lance repeated.

Keith blinked, slightly confused. “Uh, yeah,” he said slowly, “you said that.”

Lance shook his head once more. “No, it hurts,” he stressed.

Keith rolled his eyes at the dramatics. “Well, there’s not much we can do about it here,” he said honestly. It wasn’t meant to be cruel, just the truth--there wasn’t much they could do for a tummyache on a liferaft, and as such, it might be best for Lance to stop whining about it.

Instead, Lance suddenly lurched over the side of the boat, gagging dangerously but ultimately unproductively.

“Lance?” Hunk tried, pressing a hand to his back, “you good?” Lance moaned, curling in on himself.

“I think someone’s definitely seasick,” Shiro winced.

“Aw, poor Lance,” Pidge cooed from afar. She was sympathetic, but not enough to go near him. Finally, for the first time in a while, Keith softened.

“You okay?” he asked, feeling worry slice through him like his favorite dagger when instead of a sarcastic quip, Lance pressed his hands firmly to his abdomen.

“It hurts,” he whined, and suddenly, all Keith’s irritation from Lance’s whining dissipated. The shivering he’d been doing, which he’d written off as being a baby about the slightly too cool air, turned worrisome as Shiro pressed his hand to Lance’s cheeks, then his forehead, and paled.

“Oh wow,” he breathed, “that’s really bad.”

“What is?” Keith asked.

“He’s burning up. That isn’t a low grade fever--not by a long shot.” Lance wasn’t reveling in the attention, or joking away the concern, or anything that any of them might have expected from him. His muscles were contracted with pain as he lay across Hunk’s lap.

Pidge, despite her unwillingness to approach any sick person, crawled forward on the raft so that she was positioned in front of Lance’s abdomen, then pulled up his shirt.

“Hey,” Lance protested weakly, “cold.”

“Tough,” she replied. Her small hands found a point halfway between his belly button and his right hip and hovered. “I need you to tell me if this hurts,” she instructed. Evenly, she pressed, and though he grimaced, he didn’t protest--that is, until she released the pressure. At that, Lance positively yelped. His hand shot out to grab hers, as if to pull them back into the position in which his abdomen wasn’t on fire, and she cursed.

“This… if I had to guess, this is appendicitis,” she whispered gravely to the others. “Matt went to the hospital for it when we were kids--turns out, he just had the stomach flu--but the doctors did this test to see if it might be his appendix. If it hurts when you release pressure, it’s inflammation.”

Keith’s blood froze in his veins.

“Appendicitis?” Shiro echoed, staring down at a miserable Lance. Once more, he pulled himself to the side of the boat to heave, this time bringing up the meager contents of his stomach. It looked painful, and though Hunk tried to ease the discomfort by rubbing his back, Lance was still left a whimpering, shivering mess by the end of it.

“God,” he moaned, “it hurts. When’s ‘Llura comin’?”

“Soon,” Keith fabricated automatically, then turned back to Pidge. “What can we do? What does he need?”

“Surgery,” she replied, “and as soon as possible… if he’s been in pain since last night, he could only have hours before it bursts. And if that happens... “ she trailed off, her eyes being dragged toward the choppy waves and forcing the others to fill in the gaps of her sentence.

“What’s the second best thing?” Shiro asked.

“There isn’t one,” she replied. “He’s in real danger here. We just… have to hope that Allura hurries.”

Lance pressed a hand to his side, looking tearful. “M’sorry, I should have said something,” he choked, “I don’t wanna die.”

Shiro lunged forward to take his hand comfortingly. “You’re not going to die,” he promised hollowly. “Everything is going to be fine.”

They just had to hope that Allura would come quickly.


End file.
